Customizable Pronouns First Look

"Babykittyjade;c-18040178" wrote:


As far as i know they never confirmed or said that pronouns would be in live mode. I believe that's one of many assumptions but they are probably taking the players feedback into consideration.

Actually I took this as a yes, right now their plan is to have them show in Live Mode:

Going through the clickthroughs – this is obviously work in progress. You can still put and randomize your names, but there’s now a new dropdown section which says “Pronouns”. As you can see there are 4 different options. Let’s say Jessie Apple identifies as she/her/hers – as you can see it steps back and pronouns appear right next to her name. This generally would appear in Live Mode where there’s tooltips or any notifications that would refer to Jessie who uses these pronouns.

That's the part I have an issue with, not that they're adding them for those that want them, but I don't need to see what my sim's preferred pronouns are while actually playing the game, I already know what their pronouns are because I the player decided what they would be.

No need to have it attached to their name ..... again, THIS IS A SINGLE PLAYER GAME! We are not encountering other RL people controlling their sim that we would need to be aware of that sim's pronoun preferences. We are not writing texting or chatting with these sims, the game generates all text/pop-ups, we the players have no control of that, so why do we need to have these pronoun preferences right in our face?

I'm just hoping there's an On/Off toggle for displaying them in live mode. (Or that some modder can do it).

"CAPTAIN_NXR7;c-18040222" wrote:

When a professional team of game developers decides to share work in progress with their player base I would like to think that they’re open to any constructive feedback that player base may want to give based on said WIP.

This, 1000 times this. That is nearly the entire purpose of my job here. Tag me, spam me with messages with links, GIVE ME YOUR FEEDBACK ON THIS. ON EVERYTHING.

"Chicklet453681;c-18040244" wrote:

"Babykittyjade;c-18040178" wrote:


As far as i know they never confirmed or said that pronouns would be in live mode. I believe that's one of many assumptions but they are probably taking the players feedback into consideration.

Actually I took this as a yes, right now their plan is to have them show in Live Mode:

Going through the clickthroughs – this is obviously work in progress. You can still put and randomize your names, but there’s now a new dropdown section which says “Pronouns”. As you can see there are 4 different options. Let’s say Jessie Apple identifies as she/her/hers – as you can see it steps back and pronouns appear right next to her name. This generally would appear in Live Mode where there’s tooltips or any notifications that would refer to Jessie who uses these pronouns.

Oh boy.... I must have missed that since I was busy and skipped a little through the livestream replay. Thanks ☹

EA team please make this optional. I play in a totally fictional world where pronouns and gender issues don't exsist. All of the issues I pose on them are in my fictional imagination.
I do not want to be constantly reminded of one of my biggest social media annoyances ? thanks in advance.

"EA_Cade;c-18040245" wrote:

"CAPTAIN_NXR7;c-18040222" wrote:

When a professional team of game developers decides to share work in progress with their player base I would like to think that they’re open to any constructive feedback that player base may want to give based on said WIP.

This, 1000 times this. That is nearly the entire purpose of my job here. Tag me, spam me with messages with links, GIVE ME YOUR FEEDBACK ON THIS. ON EVERYTHING.

I have a simple suggestion then. In my opinion you choose the hardest way to implement this feature. If you want to implement neutral pronouns ect, make just a third option in gender panel "male", "female", "custom", give players an option to choose pronouns and the options we currently have in this pannel and give the option to name and save the custom gender. Sorry but people highlight their prefered pronouns next to the name only on Twitter and other social media maybe.

"CAPTAIN_NXR7;c-18040222" wrote:

"WaytoomanyUIDs;c-18040179" wrote:
I really dont understand why people are getting bent out of shape about the pronouns. This will not affect your existing sims, you will not be forced to choose pronouns for them. They are not removing existing gameplay to add pronouns. And unlike what some have suggested in this thread, choosing pronouns is not somehow gay or straight erasure. Gender and sexuality are toitaly different things.

When a professional team of game developers decides to share work in progress with their player base I would like to think that they’re open to any constructive feedback that player base may want to give based on said WIP.
One can have 50 experts trying to come up with great ideas, but there’s still that user experience. We as a community are here to give feedback about this user experience since ultimately we are the ones who have been and still are investing time and money in this game.

No one here is getting bent out of shape about the inclusion of customizable pronouns. Some of us are critical about the execution of this feature and how this may affect future gameplay.
Our feedback should be a valuable aspect to the Sims team, because if it isn’t, they wouldn’t share WIPS with us.
If we don’t voice our concerns now it’ll be a lot harder to change things at a later stage.

This is what WIPS are for. Constructive Feedback.
And that’s what we should give right now. Constructive Feedback.
It’s that simple.

Unfortunately, the only feedback the developers seem to want to hear from us is positive feedback. Once they start hearing negativity coming from the players, they stop communicating with us. Or just flat out ignore our concerns and do what they intended to do from the beginning. I have a son who is gay, married to the love of his life and they are in the process of adopting a child together. He and I had a discussion about this just last week after he asked me if I still played Sims4. I told him about all the changes Maxis has made to be more inclusive of the LGBT community and he just laughed and shook his head. He said he has always felt the ability to play as himself has been in the game. He never felt left out or upset in any way because there wasn't a way to assign pronouns to certain Sims. But if this seems to be important to a lot of players, then perhaps this will be a nice addition to CAS. I would have preferred new gameplay content, to be honest. But all the pronouns do is add more script and does nothing to enhance the personalities of our Sims. The pronouns won't change a Sim's personality because only traits, hobbies, sentiments and likes/dislikes can do that. But as far as repairing the shallowness of what gameplay we do have, adding pronouns won't be of much help with that.

I get why this is important to a big segment of the player base. But at the same time, I have to ask when are the players looking for new gameplay content going to be heard? There hasn't been anything since the release of Cottage Living that has added new content that isn't just window dressing. It doesn't matter how many pairs of drapes you put on that window until you replace it with a new one because underneath those drapes or curtains it will always look the same. And that is how I feel about Sims4 right now. Sims4 is dressed to the nines but has nothing to do and nowhere to go. The same old grind every day with little to look forward to. I guess I need to go and find a couple of new gameplay mods to get me back into the game.

"Sthenastia;c-18040258" wrote:

Sorry but people highlight their prefered pronouns next to the name only on Twitter and other social media maybe.

And only the small percentage of the population that actually CARES about it do it even there.

I'm male, my pronouns in English are He/Him/His but on social media, over the years, I have been mistaken for a She...because my name, and often my username, are both gender-neutral. And you know... I DON"T CARE.

I don't like labels in the first place and that's all pronouns are, no matter what pronouns you call me. I'd prefer if there were no pronouns (some languages don't have them...). But removing them entirely seems like a pretty big ask.

I will be annoyed if the pronouns are always visible next to the name. I was so annoyed when they had to make the tooltip say their age because no one could tell teens apart from the adults.

I look forward to the day maxis starts including things like being deaf or blind, needing a cane or wheelchair. I'd like to see the day when I can create a character like me who can't walk or hear. Would be nice.

I'm confused by all these people acting inconvenienced because the sims is adding pronouns, like after selecting a name, and spending 3 hours looking through clothes and redoing hair and make-up on every outfit and removing random glasses the game added to only one outfit (normally the sleeping one), like people who wear glasses only do so on hot day and not every day, selecting a radial button for your sim's pronouns (assuming they aren't defaulted which I think they will be) is just too much effort.

Sure, you may not use this feature. I probably won't as a cisgender person myself, but it's important to the people who play the game and are not cisgender to be able to create a version of themselves too. Since most of us have been able to create ourselves we haven't struggled with this but for the people who have this is going to be a big deal for them.

There are lots of things in the Sims I don't personally use or see the need for (I am looking at you weird ugly clothes) but I know other people like them and they aren't hurting me so I'm okay.

"Dannakyri1;c-18040305" wrote:
I'm confused by all these people acting inconvenienced because the sims is adding pronouns, like after selecting a name, and spending 3 hours looking through clothes and redoing hair and make-up on every outfit and removing random glasses the game added to only one outfit (normally the sleeping one), like people who were glasses only do so on hot day and not every day, selecting a radial button for your sim's pronouns (assuming they aren't defaulted which I think they will be) is just too much effort.

Sure, you may not use this feature. I probably won't as I a cisgender myself, but it's important to the people who play the game and are not cisgender to be able to create a version of themselves too. Since most of us have been able to create ourselves we haven't struggled with this but for the people who have this is going to be a big deal for them.

There are lots of things in the Sims I don't personally use or see the need for (I am looking at you weird ugly clothes) but I know other people like them and they aren't hurting me so I'm okay.

I don't think people have a problem with them being added (or at least I don't), I think it's more the fact that as of right now, they are planning to display those pronoun preferences along with the sims's name in live mode. That is what my main concern is, not that I don't want them, because I do .... I want my sims to be addressed with the correct pronouns I set up for them, I just don't need to see those pronoun preferences along with their names.

"Chicklet453681;c-18040318" wrote:

"Dannakyri1;c-18040305" wrote:
I'm confused by all these people acting inconvenienced because the sims is adding pronouns, like after selecting a name, and spending 3 hours looking through clothes and redoing hair and make-up on every outfit and removing random glasses the game added to only one outfit (normally the sleeping one), like people who were glasses only do so on hot day and not every day, selecting a radial button for your sim's pronouns (assuming they aren't defaulted which I think they will be) is just too much effort.

Sure, you may not use this feature. I probably won't as I a cisgender myself, but it's important to the people who play the game and are not cisgender to be able to create a version of themselves too. Since most of us have been able to create ourselves we haven't struggled with this but for the people who have this is going to be a big deal for them.

There are lots of things in the Sims I don't personally use or see the need for (I am looking at you weird ugly clothes) but I know other people like them and they aren't hurting me so I'm okay.

I don't think people have a problem with them being added (or at least I don't), I think it's more the fact that as of right now, they are planning to display those pronoun preferences along with the sims's name in live mode. That is what my main concern is, not that I don't want them, because I do .... I want my sims to be addressed with the correct pronouns I set up for them, I just don't need to see those pronoun preferences along with their names.

There are (broadly) two groups of people voicing concerns and criticisms with the pronouns being displayed. One group doesn't want to see it for aesthetic/immersion breaking reasons, and the other doesn't want to see it because they don't want custom pronouns in the game in the first place.

I can see the point(s) of the first group, and find them reasonable, even if I personally am fine with the pronouns being displayed (preferably below the name, not after it.)

Discussing the second group will land me in a time out, so I won't.